City court sends Leena Maria Paul to 15 day police remand

A Delhi Court on Monday sent actor Leena Maria Paul, partner of Sukesh Chandrashekhar who was arrested for allegedly duping Aditi Singh, wife of the former promoter of Ranbaxy, Shivinder Singh, of Rs 200 crore to 15 days police remand.

The police have invoked the Maharashtra Control of Orgsed Crime Act (MCOCA).

Additional Sessions Judge Praveen Singh on Monday allowed the Economic Offences Wing (EOW) of Delhi Police for 15 days to interrogate Leena Maria Paul in the matter. The police sought her remand to question her travelling with other accused to different states like Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Mumbai etc for recovery and verification of several properties purchased from proceeds of crime.

Public prosecutor Atul Kumar Shrivastava alleged that Leena and Mukesh used hawala routes and created shell compes to park the money.

The Delhi Police on Monday also produced four other co-accused -- Kamlesh Kothari, Arun Muthu, Joel Jose Matthews and B Mohan Raj.

The court also sent Leena and two other co-accused to 15 days police remand, while the other two to 7 days.

On Saturday, the Patiala House Court sent Sukesh Chandrashekhar to 16 days police remand in the alleged Rs 200 crore cheating case.

Besides ongoing investigations against him in several other cases across the country, the Delhi Police's EOW had registered an FIR against Chandrasekhar for allegedly duping the spouses of former promoters of Ranbaxy, Shivinder Singh and Malvinder Singh, of Rs 200 crore.

Former Religare promoters Malvinder and Shivinder Singh are currently lodged in Tihar jail.

At least two separate FIRs have been registered in the case so far and 23 Deputy Superintendents have been transferred on August 17, the police said.

The investigation had revealed that the accused Sukesh Chandrasekar had duped Shivinder's wife Aditi Singh and Malvinder's wife Japna Singh worth over several crores of rupees.

The women claimed that they paid crores of rupees to the conman to secure bail for their husbands and ensure their safety to Chandrasekar, who impersonated as an officer from the Union Law Ministry.

"I was assured that the Central government would be interested to work with my husband after making him an 'industry advisor' on COVID-related committees; he asked me to contribute to the 'party fund' and assured to set up a meeting either with the former law minister or home minister," alleged Aditi Singh.

Japna Singh said that she paid a total of Rs 3.5 crore to Hong Kong-based account on July 28, 29, 30, and August 6, and has shared proof of the transactions. Afterwards, the police laid a trap and arrested two of Chandrasekar's accomplices, Pradeep and Deepak, between August 7 and 8.

A senior official of Delhi Police had earlier said that the matter is quite sensitive and arrested Sukesh, who was lodged in Rohini jail; his two associates Pradeep Ramd and Deepak Ramn; two jail officials, deputy superintendent Subhash Batra and assistant jail superintendent Dharam Singh Meena; and three men, Komal Poddar, who is a manager at RBL in Connaught Place, and his two associates Avinash Kumar and Jitender Narula.

( With inputs from ANI )